Metros

I'm in the middle of several drafts, which are all in varying hot messy stages of incompleteness. One or two of them are almost ready to share with my reading public. The others might never see the light of day. But right now, rather than try to clean them up and sort them out, I'm going to clear my head for a bit and just write about whatever. 

It's Saturday morning and I'm in the passenger seat of my husband's car. We're on our way to Metros, the high school championship meet. Metros has a full formal name but I don't remember it. I'll look it up later. 

OK, I looked it up: Washington Metropolitan Interscholastic Swimming and Diving Championships. That’s quite a name, which is fitting because it’s quite an event. Katie Ledecky swam Metros, and still holds several records. Several swimmers who competed yesterday will go on to Olympic fame, too. It’s a fun meet to watch. 

*****

My son is a senior. He just missed the Metros cut time when he was a freshman. In his sophomore year,the meet and the entire season were canceled because of the COVID. He made the cut last year, but no spectators were allowed, so we watched the meet from home on a dodgy live stream, grainy video fading in and out and our son in the lane farthest from the camera. It's hard enough to tell these kids apart in the water even when you're there in person. On a live stream, any one of those rangy boys in tech suits and caps and goggles could be my kid. Now we get to watch the meet live. He’s swimming in three events, and the program will tell me which lanes to watch. 

*****

It’s Sunday morning now. The Rockville boys placed 11th at Metros, one of the best public high school finishes, and it would have been even better had it not been for a few rule oddities that kept them out of the championship final in the medley relay. This is the thing about Metros - a relay that broke Rockville’s school record and has lowered its own new record twice this season is still not quite top-ten material at Metros. 

My son’s co-captain and senior teammate, and possibly one of the future Olympians I mentioned earlier, tied the Metros record in the 200 IM. We returned last night for finals, just to watch the medley relay, which is event 1. We’d been at the aquatic center all morning for prelims, so our plan was to watch the relay final and leave. But our son told us to stay through the IM - “Toby’s going for the record, and he’s going to get it,” he said. And he did. The senior boys gathered at the turning end to cheer on their teammate, and they screamed themselves hoarse. Even though I was in the stands on the opposite side of the pool, I could still hear those boys over the already-deafening Metros finals din, cheering with such intensity that they were almost a physical force propelling their friend through the water just a tiny bit faster. I’m sure that Toby felt their energy. They all wanted that record. 

The 200 freestyle events precede the IMs, so we got to watch a tour de force performance by another likely (almost certain) future Olympian, Erin Gemmell of Stone Ridge Academy of the Sacred Heart (Katie Ledecky’s alma mater and a girls’ swimming powerhouse team). The Stone RIdge girls had been upset in the medley relay, falling to third place behind two public school teams, to my great delight. I am frankly and unabashedly prejudiced against the private school teams in interscholastic competition, especially at Metros. I spent the entire morning at prelims rooting for the public school swimmers, even in races that Rockville had no part in. I’m especially prejudiced against Stone Ridge because they’re around the corner from the base and I get stuck behind Stone Ridge drop-off traffic almost every damn morning. They need to move that school because it’s in my way. 

But even though I hate Stone Ridge, it was hard not to root for Erin Gemmell. She went out first and maintained a small but commanding lead for the entire 8 laps, finishing short of Katie Ledecky’s record but with an impressive time. What was so amazing about that swim was not the speed or the first place finish against very tough competition, but the graceful and calm manner in which she propels herself through the water, long and elegant strokes and beautiful turns executed so neatly and quickly that you almost miss them. It was obvious that she was not going anywhere near as fast and hard as she could - she had other events to swim and was wisely conserving her energy, knowing that if anyone threatened to pass her, she could open it up and easily reclaim her lead. Instead, she maintained a steady pace and cruised to an easy first-place finish. Stone Ridge or not, I was rooting for her and I was delighted when she won. And she was right to dial it down. My son texted me later that she broke the 100 freestyle record and anchored Stone Ridge’s 400 freestyle relay to another record finish. I almost wish that I’d stayed to watch. Well done Ms. Gemmell. I’ll be watching your future career with considerable interest. 

That was a fun meet. Regionals next week, states the following week, and then we’re finished with high school swimming. I’ll miss it a lot.